Affidavit No. 5201/2009

Sworn Statement

After having been warned to tell the truth and nothing but the truth or else I shall be subjected to penal action, I, the undersigned, Rudayna Bader Muhammad Jaber, of Palestinian nationality, holder of ID No. 962945176, born in 1960, a housewife, and a resident of the Wadi al-Baq‟a area, Hebron city, Hebron governorate, would like to declare the following:

I am a resident of the Wadi al-Baq‟a area. An Israeli petrol station is located at a distance of about 450 metres west of our house. Israeli settlers built it about 12 years ago on a piece of land, which they had confiscated from Na‟im Yaqin Jaber.

At around 3:15 pm on Thursday, 26 November 2009, my husband, my sister Fahima, who was visiting us from Nablus, and I were sitting on the western veranda of the house. After I heard a loud shout, I rose from my place and looked through the window, which overlooks the western area of our land. I saw a person running away from the grocery, which is located at the north-western entrance of the petrol station. He ran towards the east. I also saw a person dressed in the civil uniform standing ten metres north of the man who was running away fire three bullets from his pistol at the man. After he fell on the ground, the victim got up and ran again for a distance of almost 25 metres.

“Papa!” I heard the victim shout in Arabic after he had fallen on the ground.After the three bullets had been fired, about 15 Israeli soldiers and civilians who were waiting at a bus stop on the south-eastern sidewalk of the petrol station rushed to the station. I saw soldiers getting out of a bus that had just arrived at the bus stop and run towards the petrol station. After the victim had run for a distance of 25 metres, I saw two soldiers stand in front of him and behind him. They opened fire on the victim and he fell on the ground. The victim remained lying on the ground for about 15 minutes and received no medical aid despite the fact that ambulances had arrived at the petrol station within five minutes of the first incident of gunfire. As the victim lay stretched on the ground without being offered first aid, a grey Mercedes car approached him and its driver drove over the body of the victim back and forth three times. Meanwhile, those who had been present at the petrol station shouted at the driver. The soldiers and persons present in the petrol station then forced the driver out of the Mercedes car whilst the victim was underneath it and took him to a place, which I do not know. The victim was then pulled from underneath the Mercedes car and transported to an Israeli ambulance, which left the petrol station quickly.

On the evening of the same day, mass media reported that a young Palestinian man stabbed two female settlers who worked at an Israeli petrol station near the settlement of Kiryat Arba‟. Later, we discovered that the young man‟s name was Wasim „Usama Maswada, 21 years old, and that he sustained critical wounds due to the incidents of gunfire and being run over. Mass media transmitted pictures of the car that was driven over the young man and reported that its driver was the husband of one of the two female settlers who had been stabbed.

The petrol station in which Maswada fell and which is opposite our house is located northeast of the settlement of Kiryat Arba‟ and north east of the so-called settlement of Giv‟aat Harsina.